


The Night Before Trost

by Sexycanofsoup



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Confessions, M/M, happy birthday marco
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-20
Updated: 2014-06-20
Packaged: 2018-02-05 11:42:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1817284
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sexycanofsoup/pseuds/Sexycanofsoup
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the last year of his training Jean has been subjected to steadily worse and more frequent nightmares, and all of them have had to do with Marco's death. Finally on the night before the Trost attack Jean bolts up in bed with the worst and most vivid dream of all, and his terror for the boy he loves most ensures that he won't be able to go on as before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Night Before Trost

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a present to the fandom in honor of Marco's birthday, but I'm a few days late. sorry guys.

The Night Before Trost

Jean was lying on his side.

That was normal.

He was staring at Marco.

That was also normal.

And right now his arm was reaching out to the boy but drawing itself just short of actually touching him while his heart hammered with fear.

This too, unfortunately, was also normal.

Jean couldn’t pinpoint exactly when it had started, but he was sure it had been sometime at the beginning of their third year of training. The fear had been pretty nameless at first. Well, it hadn’t even started off as a fear--more like nameless unease. He’d found himself searching for Marco at random points in the day just to see if he was all right, and asking the boy at odd times how he was feeling. At first Jean had thought this behavior was the result of the crush he’d developed on the boy in their first year of training that had only grown stronger and deeper with each passing day, but now he knew that wasn’t the case. Because most of the time his love for the boy was something that made him feel warm and whole inside. The sudden spiking of anxiety that happened more and more these days had nothing to do with his feelings for the boy. That had been made clear to him by the dreams.

He had done nothing to trigger them, and no traumatic experience was haunting him. They’d simply started. He’d gone to bed that night the first time at the usual command of light’s out, and then several hours later he’d shot up in bed, gasping and screaming, as the horror of Marco’s blood covered face tacked itself firmly to his mind and refused to let go, even as Marco--the real one and not the awful dream version--rushed to his side and explained, over and over again that it was just a dream, and that he wasn’t dead.

He’d gotten a bit better about the dreams. That wasn’t to say that they affected him any less, he’d just gotten better at controlling his reactions. He’d stopped screaming himself awake. He’d stopped automatically shaking Marco to check if he was alive. But sometimes he still couldn’t help the silent tears of relief that poured out of his eyes when he found his Marco lying in the bed beside him, his chest rising and falling regularly, clearly alive, and clearly unaffected by the horrors of Jean’s dreams.

He wasn’t crying this time, even though the dream he’d just had was possibly the worst of them all. Marco had laid there on the ground, so cold and silent. Even the blood that had pooled around him had been cold. That meant that Marco had died alone. It meant Jean hadn’t even been close to saying him. It meant that there was no possibility of a single spark of lingering life left in the boy, and it had so terrified Jean that it had frozen his tears behind his eyes.

“Marco,” he whispered, his voice so soft it was barely a wisp of air. It was in no way loud enough to wake the boy, but Jean didn’t dare say the name again. He was afraid that if the word crossed his lips it would be in a scream as he began to tear at his hair and curse his brain over and over for torturing him this way.

_Just leave him be_ , Jean thought to himself as the hand he had outstretched toward the boy shook with the force of his suppressed movement. _It’s graduation tomorrow. He’s worked so hard for this. He’s deserved a good night’s rest. Don’t ruin it for him with your stupid idiocy. He’s alive, you moron, you can see the pulse in his neck. He’s alive, damn it, so stop shaking and go the hell back to sleep._

But he knew that was impossible. There would be no more sleep tonight. Just as there hadn’t been last week when a very similar dream awoke him and had him left him dead eyed and staring at the ceiling as the horror chased him and chased him, refusing to give up.

_He’ll be fine_ Jean told himself, even though not a single part of him believed it. _He’s going to join the military police, and you will too. You’ll be able to look after him there. You’ll make sure nothing happens to him. But nothing will happen. Because it’s the military police. You’re safe on the inside. You’re safe._

But he knew that was a lie. Nothing was safe anymore. Not since the titans had gotten in five years ago. If they’d done it once they could do it again. He knew that from his own personal experience. There was no such thing as a fluke. They would get in again, and Marco would be in danger.

_I need to be stronger. I need to be so much stronger for you, Marco_.

This wasn’t a new thought. He never had new thoughts after the night horrors. They were always old, and they were always torturous.

_I need to be stronger than the titans. I need to be stronger than death._

His fingers strained forward another couple of inches, his body fighting the orders his mind was screaming at him.

_I need to protect you. I’m selfish, and cowardly, and self-serving, but I want to protect you. I HAVE to protect you_.

He’d analyzed this thought before and come to the conclusion that even the urge to protect Marco was selfish. It wasn’t humanitarian. He just knew that without Marco the world would shrink to a tiny hard shell that he would never escape. It would poke and prod at him so that he was constantly bleeding and there would be nothing to look forward to because without Marco there would always be a constant constricting darkness.

_Leave him be!_ He commanded himself as his fingers twitched forward once more. _For once in your life don’t be a stupid selfish assho--_

The tips of his fingers brushed across Marco’s face.

His skin was soft. Even though Jean had felt it before he never ceased to appreciate it. He loved Marco’s skin. He loved the way it dimpled when he smiled. He loved the way it would flush sometimes when Marco was embarrassed. But by far his favorite part about Marco’s skin was its uniqueness. No one else in their year had such beautiful skin art. Jean knew that Marco was self-conscious about his freckles, so Jean had stopped pointing them out, but he’d never stopped appreciating them. Sometimes after the nightmares he’d count all the freckles he could see. It was soothing to see each one of them in its normal place. Occasionally he’d even see a new one, and that always made him feel like there was a little more light in the world.

But even though they were right there beneath his fingertips, he didn’t start to count them, because at the first brush of fingers against skin, he felt the boy begin to stir beneath him.

Jean snatched his hand back, but it was already too late. Marco’s eyes fluttered open delicately. He’d always had far too pretty eyelashes in Jean’s opinion. They were really hard not to stare at.

“Jean?” he muttered sleepily, twisting his head up a bit as he blinked himself slowly toward full consciousness. “Is it time to get up already?”

Jean’s heart thudded with both guilt and intense relief, because even though he’d known Marco was alive, the fear didn’t ever really recede until he heard Marco’s voice and saw his beautiful brown eyes.

“N-no,” he said quickly, sitting up and pushing his hand underneath himself, as if hiding it would prevent the other boy from guessing that it had been those fingers that had awoken him. “It was nothing. An accident. Go back to sleep.”

But Marco wasn’t going to go back to sleep. That was made clear when he pushed himself up in bed and looked at the other with purpose.

“Jean,” he exclaimed, eyes flashing with the first shot of concern. “You’re so pale. You--”

“I’m fine,” Jean said, trying for reassuring.

He must have failed because Marco only grew more alarmed. He was fully awake now.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, “Are you feeling ill? Did that stomach virus that was going around finally hit you?”

“I--”

“Hold on. I’ll go get something from the medic on staff right now. I’ll be back in just a sec.”

Jean, who was already flustered, grew even more so as Marco quickly slipped from his bed clad only in his pajama bottoms and began to search for his shoes. Before the dark haired boy could take more than a single step, however, Jean’s hand shot out in order to stop him. His fingers closed around Marco’s bare arm and pulled him to a stop.

“I’m not sick!” he exclaimed.

_Oh yes you are_ , his mind corrected itself, _sick in the head._

He ignored it. He’d known he was sick that way for a while. Why else would he regularly and horrifically depict his best friend’s death in his dreams?

“You look sick,” Marco said, without much doubt, as he leaned toward Jean to get a closer look at him. He squinted before reaching forward to touch the delicate skin beneath his friend’s eyes. Jean reacted as though the boy had shoved his hand into a Titan’s mouth.

He jumped and jerked his head away from Marco’s touch—something he knew was both incredibly rude as well as undoubtedly suspicious, and cursed his body once again for reacting without his logic’s permission.

“I’m sorry, did I hurt—“

“No! No!” Jean said trying to whisper but feeling desperate because Jean clearly wasn’t hurt by the gentle boy’s touch, but by the blooming surprise on Marco’s face, Jean couldn’t say the same for him.

_Great job dickwad_ , he thought furiously. _You hurt Marco. MARCO._

Seeing Marco’s eyes, and the way the boy drew his hands in to his chest as if stung, Jean immediately came to the opinion that he should be drawn and quartered and then fed to a group of abnormal stampeding Titans.

“Really,” Jean said, putting a hand on top of Marco’s to show he was by no means repulsed by the boy’s touch. “I’m not hurt. I’m not sick.”

But he knew that Marco wouldn’t be convinced because the other had always been so perceptive when it came to Jean. Sometimes it seemed that Marco could directly see into Jean’s mind because the accuracy of his reading of Jean astounded him.

Marco would look at the dark bags on his face and the haunted look in his eyes and knew Jean was full, up to his neck, in crap.

Marco’s eyes narrowed, and then he called him out on it. “Jean…”

The word was slightly stern but mostly full of concern. Jean had to lower his eyes.

“It’s the nightmares, isn’t it?”

Once again Jean was taken aback by Marco’s spot on judgment. His eyes couldn’t help flicking back up to meet Marco’s.

He regretted it immediately because Marco’s eyes were so full of worry and genuine feeling that Jean wanted to stab himself in the face multiple times with a fork.

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Jean could hear the struggle in Marco’s voice and he could imagine the inner warring of emotions that were causing it. No doubt the boy was feeling a bit betrayed. He might think Jean had hidden the dreams from him out of some personal motivation. He might even think Jean _resented_ him for the presence of the dreams.

Of course nothing could be further from the truth. “Didn’t want to worry you,” he mumbled, knowing that wouldn’t be good enough.

He was right.

Marco clonked him on the head lightly with a closed hand. “Stupid,” he grumbled, mussing Jean’s hair, his fingers sliding over the little hairs of Jean’s undercut.

“Not telling me is way worse. Do you know how anxious I’ve been the past few weeks because you seem to have been avoiding me? I’ve already spent so many hours going over every word I’ve said trying to find what it was I could’ve said that pushed you away.”

Jean’s eyes opened wide, but Marco wasn’t done. “After I couldn’t find anything, I finally came to the conclusion that it was probably our upcoming graduation,” Marco admitted. “I thought you’d given more thought to your original corps decision. I mean, you’ve grown a lot over the past three years. I see you changing, maturing, as well as growing restless and…” He sighed and lifted his hand from Jean’s head and pushed it against his own face instead. “I thought you’d decided against the Military Police because you’re so talented. And you’ve got so much presence—I thought that you were thinking about how much more good you’d do on the outside—“

“Wait! You thought I wanted to go into the Survey Corps?” Jean demanded, spluttering the words in his surprise.

“Well…that would sort of explain your distance,” Marco mumbled, sounding doubtful now. “I thought that you’d be resentful because of the promise we made to look out for each other. I thought you’d follow me into the Military Police because you knew that was what I wanted to do, but that you actually hated the idea, and therefore hated me for—“

“Are you out of your damn—“

“But that’s not what I want!” Marco continued despite the interruption. He looked feverish, needing to say his next few words as if he’d thought them over and over so many times that they could no longer be prevented from coming out. “I don’t care about the Military Police any more. Not really. I mean, yes, I wanted to protect the king, but I want to protect you more. I mean—god, that sounds stupid, I’m not trying to say that you _need_ protection. You’re stronger than me after all. I’m just saying that following you is more important than my ideals. I’ll follow you in whatever path you choose, so if you want to pick the Survey Corps then I’ll—“

“Just what kind of suicidal idiot do you take me for?” Jean demanded, his whisper harsh as he grabbed hold of Marco’s shoulders and gave them a rough shake. “You think I’d go and throw away my life uselessly, or _worse_ allow you to join me in some kind of suicidal mission? What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Jean…”

“I don’t understand you! Of _course_ I don’t resent you. Why would I want to go somewhere without my best friend? Where’s the damn logic in that? Nowhere, that’s what—“

“ _Jean…_ ”

“And what the hell? Join me in the Survey Corps? It’s one thing if you think that _I’m_ crazy enough to do that, but to follow a mad man in his—“

“Jean!” Marco snapped, grabbing hold of both sides of Jean’s face.

The sudden grip of Marco’s hands threw him off completely, making him forget the rest of the words of his sentence. “What?” he barked.

“You’re an idiot,” Marco stated, relief flooding his face in the form of a smile.

Jean’s heart thudded at the smile. Marco had always been a beautiful boy, but a smiling Marco was something especially exquisite. He was never more convinced that the boy was an actual angel than he was when Marco was smiling.

“If that’s actually the case then you’re getting worked up for no reason,” Marco pointed out. “And instead of wasting your breath, just tell me why you’ve been avoiding me.”

Jean blinked and then felt his defenses go up. “I haven’t been avoiding you,” he lied.

Marco showed his appreciation for this by rolling his eyes. “Don’t bother lying to me, Jean, It’s embarrassing for both of us.”

That was certainly true. Jean could already feel a blush tinging his cheeks.

“Tell me,” Marco urged sitting down on the bed because Jean and pulling the boy’s face toward himself.

Jean sighed. “I didn’t want you to know about the nightmares. And you always read me like a damn book so I had no choice but to put some distance between us.

Marco’s hands, which were still on his face, were beyond distracting. Jean could barely hear the sound of his own whispers over his own thudding heart.

“And it never occurred to you that suddenly deciding to go off eating, studying and training without me wouldn’t alarm me to your distress in the slightest?”

Marco’s tone was teasing, but Jean didn’t miss the note of rebuke in it. He closed his eyes. “I’m sorry for worrying you,” Jean mumbled.

“You’re not forgiven,” Marco said, nudging Jean’s knee with his own.

The pang that went through Jean’s chest wasn’t at all pleasant. “Marco, I—“

“Not until you tell me about your dream,” Marco amended, squeezing Jean’s face lightly before letting go.

The loss of warm felt hateful to Jean. He’d sort of been hoping that Marco would keep his hands on Jean’s face forever. That would help Jean look out for the boy, but he wasn’t going to pretend that was the whole reason he wanted Marco touching him. His skin tingled uncomfortably with the loss of Marco’s hands. He wanted to protest, but there was no way of doing that without sounding weird.

“Tell me.”

Marco’s voice seemed even more hypnotic than usual. Jean had never been able to resist Marco’s supplications, but it really wasn’t up to him this time.

“I can’t.”

It was surprising how quietly his voice could go from reliably normal to hoarse and raspy.

“Jean it’s okay—“

“ _No_. I _can’t_.”

Jean didn’t know how to properly express his foreboding horror, but he had the feeling, however irrational, that if he spoke his dream aloud it would develop and gain the power to force its way into reality.

“Come on Jean. You know you always feel better if you share it,” Marco nudged, sliding just the slightest bit more so that the space between their bodies was erased. It shouldn’t have made much of a difference—two inches difference shouldn’t have mattered. But now Marco’s thigh was pressed to his, as was his hip and shoulder, and that connection grasped at the desperate needy fear in Jean, and made him hunger far more strongly for Marco’s entire body.

But despite the feelings overwhelming him, Jean still managed to shake his head no. Because as much as he wanted Marco’s reassurances, he couldn’t risk telling over his dream and having it become reality.

“Jean…”

Now Marco’s voice was starting to match Jean’s in its hoarseness. “Jean…”

The hand that touched Jean’s face then was trembling slightly, but that didn’t matter, because Marco’s touch, however light, was enough to throw open the doors that held all the carefully concealed fear, horror and anxiety.

With just one touch all that hard work was undone.

Jean’s hand scrambled desperately to place itself on top of Marco’s—to grab it and keep it there so tightly that no one would be able to remove it. He wanted to keep his eyes locked on Marco’s for as long as he still had blood flowing through his veins. But he didn’t get to because the moment Jean’s hand touched Marco’s, vision became nearly impossible as he burst into tears.

The last bit of reserve broke. It had been exhausted to the point of collapse, and now it all poured forth, streaming from his eyes as gasping, choking sobs erupted from his throat. They were the kind of cries that, despite his preoccupation, managed to break through and scare him. Because they were wild and uncontrolled and made Jean feel as if he was entirely hopeless to his situation. But though he could do nothing but let the sobs wrack his body mercilessly, Marco was not as paralyzed.

“Jean!” he exclaimed, tugging the boy into his arms and pressing Jean’s head to his shoulder. “Jean, don’t…”

But it was too late to stop Jean who had settled into a rhythm of horrible lung crushing sobs. Marco’s hand stroked Jean’s hair and began to rock him gently. The soothing gestures, though welcome, were nowhere near enough to placate Jean. In fact, feeling them now, he couldn’t help feeling, even more, how terribly empty everything would be if Marco were gone.

Jean’s hands came up to Marco’s back, but since the boy wasn’t wearing a shirt, Jean had nothing to fist—nothing to keep him grounded—and so Marco’s skin stood in for that, with Jean’s hands grabbing for it desperately, wanting to hold onto every ounce of that freckled flesh all at once, and growing even more panicked when he couldn’t manage it.

“Jean, please, I can’t—seeing you like this is—please tell me. Please Jean, I beg—“

“You can’t die!” Jean choked out and then let out a particularly violent sob. “You can’t. I won’t allow it. I won’t let them take you from me. I refuse. You hear me? I refuse!”

“Oh, Jean…” Marco said, voice cracking on his friends name. “Jean, I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere, okay? Right by your side, remember? That was the promise. I’ll always be—“

“You don’t know that!” Jean hissed. “You can’t say that because you don’t—“

“Jean?”

Jean recognized the sleepy mumbling voice that called out his name, but he wasn’t about to use any of the precious little air that was making its way into his lungs to answer him.

“Go back to sleep, Eren,” Marco called to him, voice full of quiet authority as he pulled Jean even more tightly into the pocket of his body and rocked him a little more slowly.

“Is Jean…”

Eren still sounded three-quarters asleep, but what he did manage was full of concern.

“It’s okay. I’ve got him.”

“But—“

“I’ll take care of him, Eren. Go to sleep.”

Marco sounded confident in this answer, even though Jean didn’t know why. He couldn’t see anyone taking care of him and his constant fear of losing Marco. The problem didn’t have a solution.

Eren didn’t seem to agree because his head thunked back down on his pillow and he rolled over onto his side, already back asleep and mumbling something about Sasha and stolen cheese.

Marco paid the titan shifter no heed (he hadn’t even bothered to turn to face him) and instead whispered to the boy in his arms. “Listen to me, Jean. It was just a dream. I’m alive and well and don’t plan on letting myself get eaten by a Titan anytime soon. Everyone knows I can’t afford to leave you here alone. God knows what kind of trouble you’d get into with Eren, and you’d completely fall apart without my precious guidance.”

“I _know_ ,” Jean croaked.

Marco groaned. “That was supposed to be a joke…”

“Don’t leave me, Marco,” Jean continued, the volume of his sobs not showing much of a decrease. “I’m not strong enough. I don’t care where I stand in the top 10, nowhere is strong enough to deal with that. Because I need you. I know that if I was a good person—a worthy person—I’d say that I couldn’t see you die because of how much good you do for others, and that without you the world is a darker and less inhabitable place—and though those things are true— _extraordinarily_ true—my other reasons are so much more selfish. I want you to live because I can’t imagine getting up in the morning without seeing your face, or partnering with someone that isn’t you, or turning to my side and not seeing you in the bed beside me, or--”

“Jean, it’s okay--”

“It’s _not_ okay!” Jean protested, releasing Marco’s back and covering his face with his hands. “It’s _not_. I’ve made you into someone I can’t live without and when I think about you gone I can’t help but get all self-involved and I’m so sorry, and--”

“I’m not.”

Jean felt his next words freeze in his throat as he sat there with his hands over his face.

“I’m not sorry that my death would be just as much about you as it is about me. I’m not sorry that you can’t help but think of yourself in a world without me. And apparently I’m also an asshole because I’m not sorry to hear these words of yours even though you’re in pain because the thought of you caring so much makes me happier than I can tell you.”

Jean’s heart was trembling, the beats it produced feeling strange and out of sync.

“Marco…?” he choked out, the tears stopping as the words hit him.

He felt an even but firm pressure around his wrists as Marco began to pull at them. “I’m _not_ sorry Jean, and I won’t ever be sorry that I met you, no matter what happens. I won’t be sorry if I have to die for you, and I won’t be sorry if I have to choose you over everyone else. I am _not_ sorry, Jean, so don’t you be either.”

The stopped tears were only a temporary measure because hearing the last words brought them back in full force, Marco’s face blurring from the flood of them and making everything in the room an unidentifiable smearing of colors.

“Marco!” he sobbed, his hands free of his face and in the other boy’s wrists. “Marco, I--”

“Tell me what I can do to make it better, Jean,” Marco said gently, pulling Jean closer using his wrists. “I’ll give anything to you, Jean. Whatever you--”

Marco’s words cut off with a gasp as Jean wrenched his wrists out of the other boy’s hands and clamped them down on Marco’s face.

“Jean, what--”

And Jean kissed him. He just leaned forward through the distance he’d never dared cross before and kissed Marco Bodt’s mouth with a fierce desperate force.

He didn’t know why it was okay now that he do this--maybe it had always been okay--but he finally allowed himself the pleasure that was Marco, and he was blown away by it.

Marco’s lips were chapped, dry and a little bit cracked, and they were the most wonderful thing Jean had ever felt. His hands felt like they were melded to Marco’s face, but he forced himself to pull them away only a couple seconds after placing them there as he broke away with a gasp in order to gauge the other boy’s reaction.

As soon as he did, he felt his heart plunge, because Marco was just sitting there. He was sitting there, not having moved since the beginning of the kiss, frozen from shock. His pupils were blown out to their widest range and even with the dim light only provided by the single torch out in the hallway and the moonlight streaming in from the window Jean could see the totalness of Marco’s immobility.

And it was this reaction that made the realization of what he’d just done rush at Jean’s mind like a lethal arrow.

_Oh god, I practically assaulted him_ , he panicked, _He was trying to comfort me, was being a good friend, and I just sprang that on him out of nowhere. Three years of friendship and I destroyed it just like that. I’m going to have to say goodbye to my best and closest friend because of one thoughtless kiss. I’m broken everything, I’ve lost everything, I’ve lost him, I’ve…_

Jean’s mind snapped away from his thoughts as he watched Marco raise his hand and touch his own lips. The lips Jean had just kissed, and the lips that Jean desperately wanted to feel again. But that wasn’t possible because he’d ruined everything. It had been an enormously stupid thing to do and--

“But you like Mikasa…”

Marco’s words were a strangled whisper, but Jean was still able to hear them, even though he couldn’t understand them.

“What?” he blurted, his mind still consumed with that perfect pair of lips.

“Why would you do that? You like Mikasa.”

Jean was confused. He’d already been mentally preparing himself for Marco’s punch, maybe even a chokehold, but this reaction was far stranger than anything Jean could have anticipated.

“You like girls. You like Mikasa. Why did you kiss me?”

Marco’s voice’s volume was rising a little higher and sounded even more choked off as his frustration got a hold of it.

“Marco…”

“You like girls. You’re not like me. So why--why would you do that, Jean? Are you trying to make fun of me?”

Jean was so lost. He’d been overwhelmed by his feelings for Marco because of the boy’s precious words, and had finally acted on them. He’d been expecting rejection, anger, but he didn’t know what to call this sudden hurt that Marco was showing him, but it was scaring him. He heard the crack in Marco’s voice as he sounded Jean’s name, and it wrenched his heart open a little further.

“No!” Jean spluttered, feeling his head spin. “I would never--”

And then the meaning of _all_ Marco’s words hit him, and his mouth fell open unattractively.

“When you say “Not like me, do you mean--”

“I’m gay?” Marco asked, dropping his eyes to the bedspread. “Yeah, I am.”

Jean felt like the bed was titling him toward Marco, but even though he knew it was in his head, he couldn’t prevent himself from sliding a little closer.

Marco was gay. His best friend, who he’d been in love with forever, was gay. The friend he’d told everything to, was gay.

The revelation smacked him across the face and dropped into his lap.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Jean asked, trying to keep the raspy quality out of his voice. He wanted to be gentle. He wanted to be whisper light to the other boy now. The deep affection that rolled through him now made anything harsher ache and throb.

“Why do you think, Jean?” Marco asked, pushing his hand over his left eye and letting out a frustrated breath. “I couldn’t risk pushing you away from me.”

Despite his tender regard for the other boy, Jean couldn’t help feeling a flash of hurt and maybe even anger. “Have I ever given off the impression of being a homophobic idiot?” he demanded. “Why on earth would you think that something like that would make me push you--”

“Because you’re the one I’m in love with, Jean,” Marco blurted, smacking his other hand over his face as well, completely covering it from Jean’s view.

Jean didn’t like that. It managed to bother him even as he was overwhelmed by Marco’s confession. It was so simple and beautiful and _Marco_. He knew he wasn’t registering it, not fully, because he was still able to move and think and breathe, and he was almost certain he wouldn’t be able to keep doing any of those things if he’d _really_ internalized Marco’s words. Because he’d never dared to hope for Marco’s love. He’d never let himself fantasize that far--and that’s what the scene before him appeared to be: fantasy.

And if it was fantasy then Jean could react in the way he wanted, and what he wanted right now was to touch the other boy. He wanted that rather badly.

He touched the pads of his fingers to the backs of Marco’s hands before letting them slide down the skin over the knuckles and all the way to the bones of the boy’s wrists. “All the more reason to tell me, Marco,” Jean whispered, wrapping his fingers around Marco’s wrists and tugging with the gentlest of pressures.

“No!” Marco groaned, not budging his hands. “You’d hate me. You probably already hate me. You’re disgusted, and horrified, and you hate--”

“I love you,” Jean stated. There was no doubt in his voice. No hesitation. “I love you with all my mind and heart and breath.”

Marco’s hands fell away. They weren’t pulled away--they just fell, shock and disbelief making him forget to hold them up. His hands and body went limp, but his eyes didn’t. His eyes were so wide and alive that Jean wanted to press his mouth to them-to kiss them and bless them and never stop.

“I love you, Marco Bodt,” Jean told him, lifting his hands from Marco’s wrists and cupping the boy’s face lightly in his hands. He let his thumbs graze over Marco’s cheekbones gently. “And you are so beautiful right now that all I want to do is kiss you.”

Marco stared up at him and his breath must have caught in his throat because he wasn’t breathing. Jean felt a blip of fear rise up in him because despite the warmth the boy was giving off, Jean had never seen a living Marco so still. He had the boy’s name on his lips, and he was about to say it, to check on him, but Marco spoke then.

“For real?”

It came out as a gasp because it sparked Marco’s return to breathing.

Jean’s heart felt like it was being pushed through a suffocatingly tight tube with a sharp needle-like lining. This was what he deserved, he supposed. He’d hidden his feelings from Marco and distanced himself and hadn’t allowed the boy into his heart for fear of his love being discovered. It only made sense that Marco would express doubt, but it still hurt. But the hurt couldn’t destroy him as it ordinarily might have, because at the same time he felt his chest expanding, and it was because of Marco’s love--a love he couldn’t doubt because Marco had never lied to him, had always treated Jean with more respect and care than anyone else had. He didn’t doubt Marco, and he never would, even if the other’s love seemed impossible. And that’s when he let go of the idea of fantasy. This was real. Marco was real and his love was real and Jean was the luckiest bastard that had ever been born on this cursed earth.

“Yes. For real, so please let me,” Jean begged, his eyes flicking back and forth to both Marco’s eyes and mouth with dizzying speed. His head was already bending toward the other’s, his mouth being pulled in with a magnetic sort of force. “Please Marco.”

But Marco didn’t give his permission. He didn’t say anything all. Instead, he lunged forward and threw his arms around Jean’s neck. Jean, who’d accepted Marco’s inactivity during all this time, was thrown off balance, so that when Marco crashed their mouths together, Jean keeled over backwards, and his scrambling hands that raced to grab both Marco’s hair and back, pulled Marco down with him.

They hit the mattress with Marco on top of Jean, but the collision did nothing to stop their mouths which attacked each other’s with none of the gentleness of before. Marco’s hands tugged at Jean’s hair, yanking his head back to expose his mouth to a better angle as the kiss turned violent, both pairs of lips swelling from the force of it. Jean wasn’t surprised by Marco’s ferocity. He already knew that the boy wasn’t as gentle as others made him out to be, that the boy had grit despite his angelic nature, and that those rough edges inside of him couldn’t help but be brought out as the kiss hooked tightly into both of them and released huge vats of suppressed feelings that wrapped tightly around them and made separation impossible.

Jean grabbed Marco’s hips. The boy was making no motions to leave, but the action was instinctive, because now that he’d finally laid his hands on the person he wanted most, he wasn’t going to let go.

One of Marco’s hands slapped down on top of Jean’s as his mouth pulled away in order to growl. “Tighter. Hold me tighter, damn it. Hold me tight enough to leave permanent bruises. Hold me so that my body never forgets your imprint on it. Hold me, Jean.”

Jean let out a desperate animal sound and crushed Marco into his arms, tangling their arms and legs together as he gathered the boy in as close as he could. “Yes,” he gasped, “Always.” His mouth was already searching for Marco’s again. Needing that contact--that glorious and fierce pair of lips with all its feeling and beauty and love.

But before Jean could connect them by the mouth again, Marco pushed at his chest, struggling to sit up on top of the boy.

Jean let out a desperate cry, and his hands instinctively tightened around Marco.

“Wait, Jean,” Marco gasped.

“I thought you wanted me to--”

“Yes, I do. I very much still do,” Marco assured him, “But I need to know…”

Marco bit his lip, and seeing it, Jean eased his hold a bit and pushed himself up onto one elbow, keeping just one hand on Marco’s hip. He gave it a squeeze. “What is it?”

Marco wrapped his arms around himself and shivered. “What do you want from me, Jean?”

Jean looked up at the boy and blinked. This was either the stupidest or deepest question he’d ever been asked, and in his heat crazed mind right now he couldn’t determine which it was.

“You,” he answered. “I just want you.”

Marco looked like he either wanted to bang his, or Jean’s head against the wall. “I’m serious, Jean. Give me a serious answer.”

“I _am_ giving you a serious answer,” Jean protested, sitting up a bit more but holding Marco’s back so that he didn’t slide off Jean’s lap. “I want you. All of you. I want to always have you by my side and to be holding you both when I go to sleep and when I wake up in the morning. I want to see you smile and laugh, I want to be there for everything important, and also all the silly unimportant things. I want to be the one you turn to when you’re upset as well as the person you’ll share anything happy with. I want to finally count every last freckle of yours and finally put the searing question in my mind to ease, but most of all I want you to be happy and I’d like to be the person that makes it so. And that means that I want whatever you want, Marco.”

Jean’s hold on Marco’s hips tightened when the other boy went slack, and began to tilt forward. Jean steadied him in his arms instinctually. Making sure Marco was all right was second nature to him, and he was attuned enough with the others body to sense changes and correct for them without any thought. And because it was instinctual, Jean was able to focus all of his concentration on the other boy’s face as he took in Jean’s words.

It was a good thing he had all of his focus, because Marco’s next expression was complicated. His eyes lit up but then a second later fogged up again, and though his body twitched as if to come forward to hold Jean, his hands clenched by his sides as if to hold himself back.

Jean didn’t know what it all meant, but the crack of worry on Marco’s face was alarming and he just wanted it to stop. He wanted to say “to hell with it” and just pull Marco into a hug and figure it all out later, but Marco finally answered him.

“I want a lot, Jean.”

Well that certainly didn’t bother Jean. He stared up at the beautiful boy atop him and saw a lot he wanted as well. Marco took in the expectant look on Jean’s face and sighed. “ _A lot_ Jean. Probably more than you’re willing to give me.”

Jean frowned and grabbed one of Marco’s hands. “Hey! Don’t go around making assumptions about me! I want to give you whatever--”

“ _Stop_ Jean. Just don’t. If you like girls then--”

“What the _hell_ does that have to do with anything?” Jean demanded.

And that’s when Marco exploded. “Because in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a girl, _Jean_.”

Jean was finding it hard to keep calm as well. “I damn well know that, _Marco_.

“So then I don’t know why you don’t understand why--”

“No!” Jean protested, scrambling up so that Marco fell off his lap and onto the bed with Jean looming over him. “It’s _you_ who doesn’t understand. It doesn’t matter if I can like girls. Why does that make any difference in our case? I’m not chasing after any girls. When’s the last time you heard me mention one? I’ll bet you everything I have that it hasn’t been any time in recent memory.”

Marco was silent, and Jean knew why. Because he was right. Sure he’d had a thing for Mikasa in their first year, but that had only lasted until he’d realized his feelings for Marco dwarfed them, and despite the beauty of the training legion’s number 1, Marco, to Jean, was far more beautiful than she’d ever be.

“So…” Marco’s voice had shrunk a lot since his last statement. “Does that mean you like boys too?”

It was a legitimate question, but Jean was too pumped up to treat it as such.

“I like _you_ , okay?” he growled. “I’ve liked you for a really long time--so long that I don’t even know my preferences anymore because all I see is you. Do you understand now?”

Marco was silent, but only because he seemed to be too tongue tied for words. Also, he was blinking a lot.

Jean reached forward and gripped Marco’s shoulders and shook them once, roughly. The boy was pressed against the mattress so his head hit it once with the motion. “I said, do you understand now, Marco?”

Marco didn’t nod, but he didn’t shake his head either. Instead he stared back at Jean with fire in his eyes. Then he grabbed one of Jean’s hands in his own and let it down his body to rest on the space between his own legs. “So _this_ doesn’t bother you?”

Jean, who’d thought he was too fired up to be distracted by anything, jumped and lost every train of thought he could have possibly pursued. All he was aware of was the burning heat between Marco’s legs, and all of his thoughts were of the useless variety.

_He’s so hard_ , he marveled, feeling Marco’s length for the first time.

Well, there had been that accidental crotch touch back in training year one when they’d been helping each other put on their maneuver gear, but that didn’t count. That had _nothing_ on this deliberate touch of a purposeful and highly aroused Marco.

He wanted to answer, but there didn’t seem to be enough air in the room to do that, so all he managed in the end was a high whine.

“Jean?” Marco’s hand made to release Jean’s as worry suffused his voice, but Jean clamped down on the hand and didn’t move his own from between Marco’s legs.

This time the sound that left Jean was deeper, longer, and infinitely more sexual. “Marco,” he countered, his other hand holding tight to Marco’s shoulder in order to prevent himself from collapsing on top of the other boy.

“I-I’m sorry,” Marco blurted, giving another tug from within Jean’s hand, trying to break it free. “I shouldn’t have…you don’t want—“

“Asshole!” Jean hissed, forcing himself to yank his hand away. “Can’t you see I’m even worse?” And in so saying, he pressed Marco’s hand to the throbbing erection he’d been housing ever since his mouth had first touched the other boy’s. Marco’s breath cut off after a sharp piercing inhale.

“Jean…”

“You don’t know what you do to me, you bastard,” Jean groaned, forcing his hips to keep still—to _not_ thrust up into Marco’s hand. “For years now you’ve tortured me. Every time I get lonely, every time I close my eyes, and every time I touch myself your face is always the one that pops into my head and it doesn’t friggen leave. It’s you. It’s always you. I think about you constantly, and even when I’m not having the dreams it tortures me because up until now I’ve never allowed myself to think that I could have _this_.” And as he spoke the word he gave Marco’s hand a squeeze and shuddered. “So don’t tell me what I can or cannot give you, Marco, Because I’ve been holding too much back for so long that I’m up to nearly infinite levels of this damn stuff, bastard, so the real question becomes: can _you_ take it all?”

Marco didn’t try to tug his hand away from Jean’s anymore. His eyes widened for a moment as he took in the full meaning of Jean’s words, and the truth of what he felt in his hand, before they tightened with resolve. The next moment Jean felt intense pressure on his face as Marco grabbed his chin in a tight grip and yanked it down until Jean’s forehead collided with his.

“All of it,” Marco gasped, releasing Jean’s chin so that he could fist a handful of his hair. “I’ll take it all. I want it all.”

Jean didn’t question it. He was sick of questioning things when it came to the other boy, so when Marco looked straight into his eyes with that desire and burning, he acted.

He attacked Marco’s mouth which had been less than an inch away and bit and sucked at the boy’s lips until they fell open with a wet moan. That was when Jean released Marco’s hand and grabbed tight hold of Marco’s face as he slipped his tongue into the boy’s mouth and truly tasted him for the first time.

Marco’s tongue wasn’t idle. It rushed to meet Jean’s, touching it tentatively at first, but quickly pressing forward as his disbelief faded and he threw himself into the situation as fiercely as Jean had.

Their hands and legs were everywhere. Marco fisted Jean’s hair, which was quickly being revealed to be a preference of his, and pulled Jean closer to him, his hand pressing into Jean’s lower back, his fingers brushing over the curve of Jean’s ass. At the same time that Marco pressed down with his hand, he also thrust up with his hips, grinding their arousals together and eliciting moans from them both.

“So damn sexy,” Jean growled, ripping his mouth away from Marco’s in order to press sucking kisses to the other boy’s bared neck.

Marco shuddered and let out a lustful whimper that Jean muffled with his mouth.

“We have to be quiet,” Jean whispered when he drew apart once more. Marco’s lips were so soft and swollen from kisses that Jean knew he was already dreadfully addicted. “Or everyone’s going to wake up and, when they see and hear how hot you are, they’ll all want a piece of you and I don’t think I’m strong enough to fight them all off.”

“Do you even _want_ to fight them all off?” Marco asked, managing to be a little teasing bastard even though the way Jean was rocking his thigh against his erection was making his words come out in high little gasps.

Jean lifted himself onto his elbows on either side of Marco’s head and simply blinked, trying to determine just how serious the boy was.

“You’re so full of crap,” he muttered.

Marco gave him a toothy grin. “So you’re saying that if Eren climbed into this bed you’d be quick to push him out?”

Jean’s eyes shot open. “Eren?” he asked, too surprised to put the proper fury into the word.

“Don’t even bother telling me that all that sexual tension doesn’t exist,” Marco said breezily (speaking had become a lot easier for him after Jean had stopped rubbing against him in his surprise). “It’s the only thing that planted a seed of doubt in my mind of your apparent heterosexuality.”

Finally the anger began to trickle in. “I friggen hate that kid,” Jean snarled.

“Sure you do,” Marco muttered, looking smug.

The smirk on the boy’s face was way hotter than it had any right to be, and so pissed Jean off even further. “I want to kill the guy,” he insisted.

“You want to screw him into the wall,” Marco corrected.

That was it.

Jean reared up, seized the waistband of Jean’s pajama bottoms, and tugged. To Jean’s surprise, and eventual delight, he realized he’d managed to drag both the boy’s pants and underwear down at once so that Marco’s erection sprang free and slapped down onto his bare stomach.

The sight was a mind blowing one, but thankfully Jean’s anger was strong, and so he only stumbled slightly as he reached down to grab hold of it. At the contact, Marco gasped and let out a deep seated moan that had Jean twitching in his pants.

“You want to say that again, Bodt?” Jean demanded before giving Marco’s erection a tight, thorough twist.

Marco let out a choked out groan and bucked off the bed, but Jean grabbed the boy by the hip and slammed him back down onto the mattress.

“Do you?” Jean hissed, giving Marco’s arousal long fast pulls.

“Jean…”

The name was mangled almost beyond recognition as it left Marco’s lips, but Jean would always know when Marco was calling him, and hearing it, all of the boy’s anger turned into lust.

“Who do you want, Marco?” Jean demanded, leaning over and dragging his teeth over one of Marco’s nipples (both of which had beaded into hard little nubs). “Who do you want doing this to you?”

“Only you,” Marco gasped, biting down on his lip so hard that drop of blood welled to the surface of his it.

Something that was a lot deeper than ordinary satisfaction rose up inside of Jean and flooded his chest cavity.

“And who do you think _I_ want?” Jean grunted, pressing his tongue, teeth, and lips to every piece of Marco’s torso his mouth could reach.

“Me?” Marco guessed as Jean twisted the head of Marco’s length, causing the boy to slam his head back against the mattress.

“That’s right. You.” Jean growled. “You and only you. You going to remember that?”

He pushed his thumb over the slit in Marco’s length as Marco gasped a barely recognizable “yes.”

“What’s that?” Jean demanded, digging his finger into the slit and twisting his hand over the head at the same time “I couldn’t hear you.”

“Yes!” Marco cried, almost sobbing. “Yes. Yes, _god,_ just take your damn clothes off already, Yes.”

The demand on Marco’s part brought Jean back down to earth for a brief moment, and in that moment he realized that holycrapdamn he was holding Marco’s naked length in his bare hand with absolutely no barriers between them.

The realization was so monumental that it made him freeze, and, Marco, enterprising young lad that he was, seized the opportunity to rid Jean of his clothes. He reached up and copied Jean’s actions, hooking fingers into both layers and tugging downward so now it was Jean’s erection that finally left the tight confines of his clothing and met the slightly chilly air of the dorm.

Marco’s pupils did the crazy blow-out thing again. ”Shit,” he muttered, cursing aloud for only the fourth time in all three years that Jean had known him. The first time had been when Shadis had nearly ripped his head off after Marco had accidentally tripped him on one of their training runs. The other two times had been when he’d misfired his gear and crashed into a tree, and then a wall.

Marco’s hands released Jean’s pants and slid up his bared thighs. His hands were shaking.

“Oh, _jean_ ,” he whispered, reaching the top of his thighs and brushing his thumbs along the inner creases. Jean let slip a low moan.

Slowly Marco raised one of his hands to Jean’s length, closing warm and elegant fingers around it before giving it an experimental pull.

Jean’s arms trembled as a shot of tight and white hot pleasure sliced though him and cleaved his mind into two useless lumps. All his neurons seemed to be have concentrated themselves on his erection, and they were all firing at once.

_It’s not supposed to feel this good_ , he thought distractedly. _It never feels even half this crazy when it’s your own hand._

Jean reached down to return his hand to his ministrations on Marco, but as the other boy gave his length another pull, Jean’s hand spasmed, and grabbed onto Marco’s arm for support.

Marco took this reaction as encouragement and tugged at Jean’s arousal more confidently.

“Powerful, right?” Marco murmured as Jean let loose another gasping moan. “You’re so beautiful like this. I’ve pictured you under my touch like this countless times but it never lived up to the reality. You’re the most beautiful creature I’ve ever laid my eyes on. It hurts just to look at you.”

The words were so embarrassing that they even managed to pierce through the shell of desire that Jean had thought had been wrapped around him in an air tight seal. The problem was that his love for Marco was quickly outstripping his lust for him, and as Marco’s touch continued to resonate everywhere inside of Jean, he found it extraordinarily difficult to keep embarrassing words from slipping out of his mouth. Words like, “Please bear my babies,” and, “Marry me you gorgeous bastard.”

In order to keep his mouth shut he had to busy himself otherwise. He gently pried Marco’s hand from his length and raised it to his mouth for a quick kiss, and then looped it around his neck.

Marco let out a sharp cry of protest, but Jean shushed him with soothing murmurs as he lowered himself down on top of Marco. He had to draw his next breath from between clenched teeth as the feeling of his erection pressed against Marco’s tore his mind to shreds.

Marco’s mouth fell open but the only sound that left it was a whistling of air.

He wanted to see more of that--more of Marco coming undone, and so he reached between them and grasped both arousals in his hand and pulled them together, the motion a little jerky from barely suppressed desperation, but the destroyed moan that left Marco’s throat let him know that it was far from ineffective.

Jean’s eyes were squeezed tightly shut, and his face was buried in Marco’s neck as he worked them both together, the feeling of Marco against him so strong that he was only preventing himself from coming by his intense desire to have Marco come first.

“ _Jean_ ,” Marco gasped, hips grinding unevenly into Jean’s as their motions grew more erratic. “Jean, you--you’re _everything_ Jean.”

Marco’s hands were wrapped around Jean tighter than his gear straps had ever been, and yet even though he was sure the pressure would leave bruises tomorrow, he wanted Marco to hold him harder, to squeeze them together so tightly that Marco would have no reason to fear ever again because Jean’s body would be a permanent barrier between him and the endless evils that inhabited their world.

Marco’s breaths became faster and more labored, and now his cries of pleasure were merging into one long keening sound. And the boy was so beautiful and sexy that Jean knew that he wasn’t going to be able to stop his trajectory no matter how much he wanted to hold back to wait for the boy in his arms.

“Marco,” Jean gasped as the pace of his hips, hand, and breath all increased without his being aware of it. “Marco I--I’m sorry but I can’t anymore. I’m going to--”

“Me too,” Marco panted, digging his fingers into Jean’s back as his body shuddered with his oncoming orgasm. “God, Jean, I’m so close. So damn close and--and--”

Marco’s cry exceeded all the others in terms of both the need that formed it and its sharpness.

This time when Marco shuddered against him, Jean knew it was the boy’s release even before the first jet of his orgasm hit Jean’s hand and stomach, and he was immediately lost to it. Fireworks of color exploded against the black interior of his eyelids as he came, and came hard, the force of it causing his body to judder violently as he climaxed against the other boy, joining Marco’s cries with his own, each crying out the other’s name as they reached their peak.

Jean wasn’t sure when Marco finished, but even before his own orgasm was done, his hands were already scrambling to get ahold of Marco, to draw him close and press breathless kisses against his neck and jaw, and to tell him over and over again in a gasping mantra how very damn much he loved him.

Jean felt Marco go jello-like beneath his hands, and the boy’s relaxation helped bring Jean down from his own high so that his hands and mouth were able to slow, and eventually become languid. Finally he allowed his face to collapse against Marco’s chest.

“God,” was all he managed to mutter after all that, and he heard a little breathless laugh leave Marco from beneath him.

He felt the boy’s hand slide through his hair, dragging his nails lightly over Jean’s scalp and setting off tingles that left Jean shivering against Marco’s spent body.

Jeans mind was a mixture of pleasant buzzing and endless popping endorphins. These feelings only increased when he felt a line of soft kisses pressed against his jaw and neck.

Big sweaty brute,” Marco whispered and pressed another kiss to Jean’s jaw, right below his ear.

A content kind of purr rumbled through Jean’s chest as he pulled Marco’s to his and planted a sloppy kiss on his mouth. “Shut up, you’re sweaty too,” he pointed out.

“And sticky,” Marco added, continuing his wonderful scalp tickling, “And stupidly in love.”

“Stupid? What’s stupid about loving me?” Jean asked, pulling Marco with him as he eased himself down onto his side so that they were still facing each other.

Marco nuzzled Jean’s face with his cute little freckled nose. “I dunno...how bout the fact that your hobbies include counting freckles, dreaming about my death, and getting into bloody fights with titan shifters?”

Jean scowled at the unhappy memory that had woken him up in the first place and buried his face in Marco’s neck to hide it. “Shut up. I can’t help it.”

Marco ran his fingers down Jean’s back and kissed the top of his head. “I know. I just wish you didn’t have to suffer with it.”

Jean’s hands tightened against Marco’s hips. Just as long as Marco’s death stayed in his dreams, Jean would never complain. He could take the terrifying dreams and sleepless night so long as when he awoke he could feel Marco’s warmth with his body.

“That didn’t take very long, did it?”

The words came from neither Jean, nor Marco, and were therefore wildly unexpected.

Jean’s face shot up and stared into the darkness, glaring at the intrusion that was Reiner.

“Shh, you’ll embarrass them, Rei,” Bertholdt whispered at a far lower volume.

“Hey, if they’re going to screw each other _that_ loudly they really have no right to complain.”

Jean found himself spluttering indignantly as the fuzzy warmth in his chest curdled to sour mush, but Marco wasn’t nearly as thrown off, and his next words were relatively light.

“I don’t think I really need to hear that from the boy who woke up Shadis all the way down the hall because of how loudly he roared his boyfriend’s name.”

Reiner chuckled. “Ah...good memories. Right Bertl?”

There was a rustling of sheets as Bertholdt buried his face in the bed and then a muffled, “Go drown yourself in a toilet.”

“That sounds a bit too kinky for my tastes,” Reiner admitted.

If Jean had been a Titan shifter he would have transformed by now.

“Go the hell back to sleep asshole!” he snarled.

“Yes,” Marco agreed, stroking Jean’s hair soothingly, “Or at least keep quiet like Connie.”

“Wait?” Jean spluttered, “Connie’s awake too?”

“No,” a grumbly Connie answered from the next bed over. He had two pillows over his head and looked like he was trying to suffocate himself. “I’m obviously having a nightmare from which I can’t wake up.”

“Poor sod,” Reiner muttered, “It must be hard being the only completely straight guy in the dorm.”

“I think Thomas is also straight,” a sleepy voice that sounded a lot like Armin called out.

“Yeah, but nobody cares about him,” Reiner pointed out.

“That’s true.”

“I hate all of you,” Thomas grumbled, pulling his blanket up a little higher under his chin.

“Wait,” Jean said, understanding trickling through him, “Is _everyone_ awake?”

“Eren isn’t,” Armin offered, sitting up and poking the Titan shifter in the head. The boy mumbled and turned over onto his stomach, mumbling something about “Killing them all” before going back to his regular deep breathing.

Well thank the lord for small miracles, jean thought, but not for long.

“The rest of us are up though,” Reiner reminded him, “And we can all see your pasty white ass.”

Jean looked down and the view that greeted him reminded him that both he and Marco were naked as Titans. His eyes widened, and then his hand shot out and grabbed a handful of his blanket and yanked it over them both.

Reiner let out a surprised laugh and ruffled Bertholdt’s hair. “You’re right,” he said fondly, pressing a kiss to his boyfriend’s hair. “He _does_ have ‘bottom’ written all over him.”

A chorus of agreement went up throughout the dorm, and Jean realized that he’d never been more convinced that all of his roommates, with the exception of Marco, were assholes.

“What did you just say to me, Braun?”

Reiner held up his hands in a gesture of innocence. “Hey, no need to get offended. It’s not an insult. I’ve bottomed before. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

That was entirely too much information for Jean to bear and he wanted to curse out every deity in existence that had allowed the image of Bertholdt screwing Reiner to be planted in his head, probably forever.

“Bottoms are wonderful creatures,” Reiner continued even though all Jean wanted him to do was crawl off into the nearest ditch and bury himself. “No top would be complete without one. It’s the most wonderful balance in the world and--”

“Damn it Jean, now he’s going to wax poetic about the wonders of gay sex, and it’s all your fault,” Connie snarled as Reiner went all teary eyed as he began to explain the beauty of the deep and implicit trust that a bottom had to have in his top.

“That’s the fourth time this week,” Armin sighed, curling up at the very edge of his bed so he could place his arm around Eren.

“If you bastards aren’t listening I’m going to have to start all over again,” Reiner threatened.

“I’m listening,” Thomas piped up.

“I was talking to everyone except you,” Reiner clarified.

“What did I ever do to you anyway?” Thomas huffed.

Reiner went all teary eyed again and Bertholdt was quick to jump up and place his arms around the massive blonde. “It’s okay. It was just one time.”

“One time too many!” Reiner cried, wrapping his arms around the boy in return and burying his face in Bertholdt’s chest, obviously needing all the comfort the boy could offer.

Jean knew that Reiner was referring to the one time that Bertholdt had mistaken Thomas for Reiner from behind. They had similar haircuts and color and from a sitting position the mistake in identity was an honest one. But every time Reiner was reminded of the kiss his boyfriend had mistakenly placed on Thomas’s head that day he needed to lock himself in a room with said boyfriend and very thoroughly determine that Bertholdt did indeed still love him to pieces.

“Bertl,” the big gay baby sniffled. “Don’t ever leave me for another blonde. It’ll break my heart into sharp unrecognizable pieces.”

“Don’t worry,” Bertholdt assured him as Reiner began to plant kisses on every piece of the boy he could reach, “I have my hands way too full of your melodrama to have time to look for someone else.”

“You’re wonderful Bertl,” Reiner murmured, eyes alight as he reached up and grasped the boy’s face between his hands. “Let’s make love.”

“DON’T YOU DARE!” was shouted by at least 10 people in the dorm at once including Jean who felt himself break out into a cold sweat. He might want to screw Marco more desperately than he’d ever wanted to do anything else, but that didn’t mean he had even an ounce of interest in watching the huge blonde get it on with his chronically sweaty partner.

“Oh come on,” Marco said flicking Jean’s forehead, “It wouldn’t be _that_ bad.”

Jean had never been so mortally offended by anything Marco had said before. “You’re right,” he snapped. “It would be _worse.”_

Marco grinned. “Really? You’ve obviously never seen the abs on the boy.”

“The boy that called me a _bottom_ ,” Jean corrected.

“You have a problem with bottoms, Jean?” Marco growled with false aggression as he tugged Jean back down on top of him. Their bodies were still a messy disaster, but Jean couldn’t find any brain space to care because he was back at being overwhelmed by the reality of being against Marco’s naked body.

Marco wrapped one of his legs around Jean’s waist and gave him a brain melting little sexy smile that obliterated him. “You have a problem with me?”

Jean’s heart had clearly exploded and that was the reason he couldn’t feel his face because his circulation had stopped.

Marco arched his back just enough to allow his crotch to graze Jean’s. “That’s really too bad,” he murmured walking his fingers down Jean’s back. “I was hoping to do all sorts of things with you…”

No. no. Marco couldn’t do this to him. He couldn’t turn him on like this with everyone, save one asshole Titan shifter, looking on. He had already been almost too flustered to function before, and now it was much worse.

Marco must have seen the helpless foundering on Jean’s face because his eyes glittered with mischief. He slid his hand from Jean’s back and seized his hand once more. Only this time Marco seemed a whole lot more confident.

Jean bit his lip as Marco began to slide Jean’s hand down their torsos. Marco didn’t have to try to be sexy. His every movement seemed inherently smoother and more elegant than Jean’s. And Jean was so mesmerized by Marco’s light touch that he missed Marco’s true destination until the other boy pushed Jean’s hand over the swell of his ass.

Jean hissed as his fingers brushed over the skin there. Jean had always appreciated the view that Marco’s butt provided, but said butt had been invariably clothed whenever Jean allowed himself to stare at it. But now—oh god— _now…_

“So you’re saying you really don’t want to explore this at all?” Marco whispered as jean gripped Marco’s ass and a helpless groan escaped him.

If Marco was offering what he _thought_ the boy was offering, then Jean knew he really was lost, because the idea of joining himself with Marco, of being _inside_ him, was enough to make his recently spent organ twitch with approval.

“Marco…” Jean rasped, feeling weak and strong, as well as helpless yet hopeful. “ _Marco_.”

Marco’s smirk was softened by eyes melted by intense affection. “That’s what I thought,” he murmured, pulling Jean down for a tender kiss.

“If they start doing it again, that’s it, I’m quitting the army to become a pastry chef,” Connie groaned, wrapping his pillows so effectively around his head that he looked like a grumpy cloud.

“I’m just going to head to the girls’ dorm,” Armin said. “They’ve already accepted me as one of their own. They call me their blonde mushroom princess.”

What Armin didn’t know was that this wasn’t a title coveted solely by the girls. Each of the boys in the dorm, as well as Shadis himself, inwardly referred to the boy in the same manner.

“It’s not any better there,” Connie grumbled. “Ymir is the loudest lesbian this world has ever had to suffer.”

“Wait,” Reiner said, ever the confused homosexual. “Don’t straight guys usually _like_ horny lesbians?”

Reiner, who was so gay he actually pooped rainbow colored turds, had understandable difficulties when it came to comprehending the heterosexual man’s psyche.

“Ymir isn’t just a lesbian,” Connie explained. “She’s a deadly force of nature who should never be underestimated. Frankly, I don’t know how to explain the fact that Krista’s still alive other than to put it down to witchcraft.”

“I knew that overly cute exterior was hiding something,” Thomas noted, which everyone ignored.

“I suppose we can all just sleep in the hallway,” Armin said, though his body made no move to follow through with the words. In the last few minutes he’d left his bed, settled himself on Eren’s, and proceeded to stroke his hair to death.

Connie glanced up and saw the way Armin was practically glued to Eren’s side, and groaned. “I can’t believe I’m actually saying this, but as long as I’m already suffering, you might well go ahead and make your move. It’s not like I could be any more miserable.”

Reiner grunted his approval. “Go get him, mushroom boy.”

Armin blushed adorably, though it was hidden in the dim lighting. “No I—I can’t. He’s…I don’t think he feels about me that—“

Marco, whose kiss with Jean had become quite deep and full of heavy panting and enthusiastic hands, pulled his mouth from the other’s with a slick pop and gasped, “Do it, Armin. It’s amazing. Don’t you think so, Jean?”

Jean, who had been completely consumed by the kiss, thankfully hadn’t been aware of any of the discussion around him, and so had no idea what Marco was asking as he said his name. But Jean did manage to pick up the word “Amazing” and, looking at the boy in front of him, couldn’t help but agree.

“Hell yeah,” he grunted, thinking that Marco certainly was amazing, as he angled for the boy’s mouth again.

A moment later they were back to their heavy making out and the other boys were free to continue their conversation.

“He does want it, Armin,” Bertholdt said in a voice just loud enough to be heard over Jean and Marco’s moans. “I know it.”

Reiner beamed, and pressed a kiss to the back of Bertholdt’s neck. “Bertl is amazingly intuitive about this kind of stuff, so if he says that—“

“Intuition has nothing to do with it, Rei,” Bertholdt muttered.

Reiner squeezed him and laughed. “There’s no need to be modest. No one is going to—“

“No, I’m not being modest. Intuition has nothing to do with it. We were doing maneuver gear exercises and Armin was climbing one of the practice walls and Eren was standing beside me, waiting his turn, and as he looked at Armin his mouth fell open and his eyes kind of glazed over, and then he said, probably without knowing it, that he wanted to screw Armin in the ass.”

This statement was met with several moments of silence, and then it was broken as Connie sat up in bed and launched his pillow at the floor.

“That’s it,” he growled, and jumped from his bed landing barefoot on the floor and stomping over to the other side of the room where Armin and Eren were.

Everyone jumped, never having seen Connie actually reach his breaking point, and Armin sat up, body naturally pushing himself between Eren and the seemingly crazed boy storming toward them.

“Connie—“

But Connie ignored Armin, pushing him aside, before grabbing hold of a sleeping Eren, who was dead to the world, and giving him a rough shake.

“Oi! Wake up idiot!”

Armin grabbed hold of one of Connie’s arms, but he might as well have been tugging at a chair leg for all the attention Connie gave him.

Eren partially blinked his eyes open. “I didn’t take your potato,” he mumbled, reaching up and giving Connie’s bald head a pat.

It was a testament to Connie’s determination that he wasn’t thrown off by this. He pulled Eren’s chin up, forcing the still pretty-much-asleep Eren to look at him, and then, carefully analyzing his face for his reaction, clearly and loudly stated, “Armin Arlert.”

The effect was immediate. Eren’s face went from sleepy and confused to sleepy and hopelessly and goofily happy. “My little blonde mushroom princess.” Eren mumbled, smiling like the utter loon he was for the boy.

That was all Connie needed to see. He shoved Eren into Armin’s arms. “Wait until I’m out of here before you kiss him,” he growled, and then stormed out of the room, muttering about how he was never going to leave the wonderful sphere of Sasha’s protection ever again.

Neither Eren nor Armin heard him. Eren, because he didn’t seem aware of anything much now, and Armin, because he appeared to be hyperventilating.

The boy’s panic reached Eren more than anything else had, and his hands came down to smooth Armin’s hair back as he mumbled, “What’s wrong, Armin? Who hurt you? I’ll kill them.”

“So romantic,” Reiner muttered before Bertholdt shushed him.

At that moment Marco pushed up against Jean’s chest and gasped, “I want to see this.”

Jean, who felt flat out drunk, staggered to a sitting position. “What?”

Marco pointed toward where Eren and Armin were standing, and Jean blinked.

“Wait. When did Jaeger become conscious?” he mumbled, scrubbing at his face. There wasn’t an inch of his skin that wasn’t tingling or shouting out for Marco.

Marco opened his mouth to answer but Jean tackled him to the bed once more. “Never mind. I don’t care. I need to taste you.”

Marco laughed at the same time he cried out. “Nooo! I want to see the cute kiss. I’m going to miss it!”

“Use your imagination,” Jean growled and pulled one of Marco’s nipples into his mouth.

Marco’s laugh cut off abruptly and became a moan.

“So sensitive…” Jean murmured, flicking the small pink nub with his tongue.

Marco bit down on his lip and pushed up to strain against Jean’s body. “Stop turning me on you big galoomp,” he said, slapping at Jean’s head. “Everyone’s awake. We can’t go further than this.

“Don’t care,” Jean growled reaching down for Marco’s erection, but Marco batted the boy’s hand away.

“Uh uh,” Marco said. “If you don’t calm down I’m going to kick you in the head.”

“Don’t. You might hurt yourself. I have a very hard head,” Jean informed him.

Marco laughed and pressed his lips to Jean’s forehead. “That I know,” he said, and pulled Jean against his back and wrapped the boy’s hands around his waist.

“Wait, what are you—“

“Cuddling,” Marco said, snuggling into Jean’s front. “It’s good for you. Trust me.”

Jean blinked and looked down at the warm beautiful bundle in his arms. His mind still hadn’t finished clearing, but he could have been brain dead and still known what to do in this situation. He wrapped his arms more effectively around Marco and pulled him into the warm cocoon of his body.

Marco settled his head onto one of Jean’s arms and crossed his own over Jean’s remaining arm as he let out a deeply happy sound that was so adorable that Jean choked on his own spit.

“You okay there, Jean?” Marco asked, looking over his shoulder to check on the boy he loved with a knowing gleam in his eye.

Jean managed to keep his lungs down until he got his hacking and spluttering back under control. By that point Marco was definitely smiling.

“Think you’re so damn sexy, don’t you?” Jean grumbled, nudging Marco’s lips up and giving him a light peck.

Marco smiled against Jean’s lips. “My best friend certainly seems to think so.”

“You’re the dictionary definition of the term ‘little shit,’ you know,” Jean grumbled, picking a sweaty strand of Marco’s hair off of the boy’s face.

“But you love me,” Marco pointed out, kissing Jean’s fingers as they drew away from his hair.

“I do,” Jean admitted, without grumbling. “Very much.”

Marco looked up at the ceiling and blinked rapidly several times. “That makes me so happy, Jean,” Marco said after a moment, sounding a little raspy.

_The fact that I can put my hands on someone as beautiful and special as you makes me believe in miracles_ , Jean thought, interlacing his fingers with Marco’s.

Miracles like Marco surviving.

Miracles like believing his dreams were nothing more than the panicked productions of an overprotective mind.

Miracles like a reality in which he’d be able to go to sleep with Marco like this every day for the rest of his life.

Miracles that he could only start to believe with Marco, nestled as the boy was, in Jean’s arms.

“Marco?” Jean murmured, wanting the boy’s eyes again.

Marco, who was still blinking a little more than normal, tore his eyes from the ceiling to look back at the other boy.

“Yes?”

Jean’s question froze in his throat as he looked at the beautiful boy’s eyes and noticed something that, in his distraction, he hadn’t noticed before.

He raised the fingers of his free hand, and very gently laid the pads of them beneath Marco’s eyes and traced the dark circles housed there that were just as dark, if not darker, than Jean’s.

Jean felt his mouth go dry. It suddenly felt like he’d been chewing on linty socks rather than kissing the boy he loved. A horrible feeling he couldn’t quite interpret gripped him. Because even if his mind didn’t understand, his body sensed it. Sensed something that threatened everything they had.

A soft apologetic smile crossed Marco’s lips.

“Marco…” Jean said hoarsely, a slice of pain causing his ribs to contract and him to gasp. The pain was familiar, and yet seemed more intense than usual after the healing and overwhelming pleasure he’d just been experiencing.

Marco shook his head and gently lifted Jean’s fingers from his face and curled the tips of the fingers down before giving them a squeeze.

“But—“

“Don’t, Jean,” Marco murmured, touching Jean’s lips before running the same fingers down the boy’s jaw. “Let the moment be.”

No. Jean couldn’t do that. He could feel the first swellings of familiar panic. But it didn’t make sense, because the panic had always been calmed when he saw Marco’s face, but it wasn’t being calmed now. It was getting worse. Marco let his hand drop from Jean’s face to touch Jean’s chest on the space right over Jean’s hammering heart.

“I want this moment, Jean. Give me this moment, okay? I’m so happy right now.”

Jean started down at Marco. Every one of his instincts was screaming in a violent and terrifying way. Something was _wrong_. Something was extremely and horrifically wrong. And Marco knew that. He was wearing a far too understanding look on his face. He _knew_ , and it was making Jean want to grab him and shake the answer out of him. He needed the answer. He needed to know what Marco knew.

But he couldn’t ask. Marco didn’t want him to ask. It had been the only thing he’d asked for.

For as long as Jean had known him, Marco has been the one to give. This was the first time in Jean’s memory that Marco had genuinely asked something of him. And that’s why Jean’s heart clenched up and a huge lump rose in his throat, because he was going to listen to the boy’s wish. He had to.

Jean swallowed, and the lump in his throat ensured that the motion hurt. But then he did something even more painful. He forced a smile to his face.

“Of course,” he said.

The words sounded like they’d been stretched over a bed of nails and then pounded with a sledgehammer—but he said them.

Marco let out his breath, and as he did, he released a smile that was so angelic that Jean would have thought him dead if he hadn’t felt the way the boy’s chest was expanding and contracting in his arms.

Marco turned around so that he was facing Jean, closed his eyes, and laid his forehead against Jean’s shoulder.

Jean pulled the boy’s chest flat against his, and tangled their legs together.

“Marco, I…I just have one…I need—“

No good. He took a breath and started again.

“Just stay. Whatever happens, just stay with me.”

Marco didn’t look up, but he was silent for a moment before he answered, and that silence was everything Jean needed as an answer.

“As long as there’s still a breath in my body, I will be yours,” he promised. “There’s no force powerful enough to keep me away from you while I’m still alive. Like I said, I’ll follow you in whatever path you choose.”

The words did nothing to assuage Jean’s fear or panic. They should have. The words were beautiful. But beneath them he could hear all the words that Marco wouldn’t say. Dangerous, heartbreaking words. In reaction, all Jean could do was concentrate on the beating heart pressed against his own. His eyes were closed, and so he didn’t see Marco’s kiss coming until the boy’s lips met his own.

Jean kissed him. He kissed him with the aching kind of tenderness that comes from loving someone more than yourself.

He let Marco’s lips calm him, because the boy was pushing reassurance into him, giving it to Jean to borrow, and Jean appreciated it. He would never get used to Marco’s generosity. It managed to surprise him every time.

Marco continued to kiss Jean even as tears—just two of them—slipped from Jean’s eyes and ran down his cheeks. Marco kissed Jean’s mouth, then the tear trails, and then the boy’s eyelids before finally resting his forehead against Jean’s.

“I love you,” Marco whispered. “It’s a really overwhelming feeling, and I know I’ll never have it for anyone else. You’re it for me, Jean, and now that you’re here beside me there’s nothing left in this world that I can ask for. Thank you for existing, Jean. Thank you for everything.”

Jean couldn’t speak. He knew that if he did then he would really start to cry, and it would be ugly and desperate, and the tears wouldn’t stop until he was completely empty. And that could hurt Marco, and he didn’t want to hurt him. That was the one thing he wanted to prevent at all costs. So he simply clenched the boy’s hand and held it against his heart, letting the feeling of being connected flow through him and soothe him.

After they’d been like that for several minutes, Marco leaned forward, smoothed Jean’s hair back, and then pressed a kiss to the crown of his head. “Good night, Jean,” Marco murmured. “We’ve got a big day tomorrow. Get some rest.”

And so Jean dutifully closed his eyes and nuzzled into Marco’s body. Their arms were wrapped tightly around each other, appearing inseparable.

Jean didn’t fall asleep right away, but eventually he began to drift off, and finally, when his breath had evened out in true slumber, Marco opened his eyes and let himself drink the boy in.

He didn’t allow himself to do that often—only on the nights of the dreams. The dreams he had of his own death. Dreams exactly like Jean’s. Dreams that had been haunting him for a year now.

But unlike Jean, the nature of Marco’s distress wasn’t his death—it was for the screaming, weeping boy he always left behind in his dreams. The boy he loved more deeply and completely than anyone could reasonably expect from a boy his age.

“I’m so sorry, Jean,” he whispered, and kissed Jean’s head one more time.

He was so thankful that he had gotten a chance like this in the end. There was no feeling in the world as sweet as the one that came from holding Jean in his arms. It didn’t matter that it was the last time he’d ever do so. That didn’t change how beautiful this moment was even if a layer of thick sadness and loss overlaid it all.

It was only when he was truly sure that Jean was in the deeper stages of sleep that Marco finally allowed the tears to fall. He made sure they were silent, and that he didn’t shake. Well…maybe his hands shook a little as he gently and carefully stroked the boy’s hair. But otherwise he was still and silent as the tears fell in a continuous stream down his cheeks and onto his neck.

Because he knew something that jean didn’t. He knew because his latest dream had told him something that Jean’s had not.

He knew he was going to die, and he knew it was going to be tomorrow.

He knew it in the same way that dogs sensed an oncoming storm.

He was going to die, and Jean wouldn’t. That was just the way it was.

Marco didn’t let the motions of his hand stutter as he kept stroking Jean’s hair through the passing hours.

He knew that his biggest regret was his lack of strength. Maybe if he had been stronger—if he’d been like Mikasa, who he knew Jean so admired—he’d have been able to keep himself alive and stay by Jean’s side. Stay where he belonged.

But he wasn’t stronger, and he wouldn’t survive. And finally, with the warm and precious boy in his arms, he was able to come to terms with it. He only hoped that Jean would find comfort after his death. He didn’t care who it was with, just as long as it happened soon so Jean didn’t have to suffer long.

And then, as the sun began to rise and push fingers of light through the dusty dormitory windows, Marco laid his head against Jean’s chest, eyes now dry, and whispered just two more words.

“Goodbye Jean.”

\---

**Author's Note:**

> It's angsty. And it's heartbreaking. But that's the Jeanmarco ship in a nutshell, isn't it? Before I get pelted by moldy cheese I'd just like to say in my defense that this fic was supposed to be way way worse, but I couldn't do it in the end. I couldn't write that and murder my readers. So you're left with this...thing. If anyone needs hugs, as always, I'll be more than happy to hand them out. I love you guys, and your feedback always brightens my whole day. Thanks for reading.


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